Keira Knightley “first choice” for Rosaline
It’s based on Rebecca Serle’s yet-to-hit-store-shelves novel When You Were Mine which tells the story of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet through the perspective of teh character Rosaline – the one Romeo had his eye on before Juliet entered the picture. Vulture decribes the discussions between the studio and Knightley as “nascent” and they add that Lily Collins (The Blind Side) is a contender as well. (Vulture)

Rosamund Pike negotiating to join Tom Cruise in One Shot
Well that was fast. (Deadline)

(above) Trailer: Daniel Radcliffe in The Woman in Black
“While taking care of a deceased client’s estate, a young lawyer encounters a mysterious woman dressed in black and uncovers a tragic secret.” Coming February 3, 2012

Brian Grazer and Ron Howard still hoping to move forward with The Dark Tower
Someday. Somewhere. You didn’t think they were just going to pick up their chips and go home when Universal backed out, did you? The same likely goes for The Lone Ranger which currently has the producer trying to reduce the cost and a new script with fewer supernatural elements. (THR)

Matthew McConaughey to join Steven Soderbergh’s Magic Mike
This is the Channing Tatum stripper drama based on Tatum’s life. (Variety)

Dakota Fanning to star in Effie
Emma Thompson (who will also act in the film) wrote the script based on the life of Euphemia Gray, the wife of critic John Ruskin who never had sex with her in their 5 years of marriage. (Deadline)

8 Responses to “News du Jour: 8/17/11”

Here’s a surprise– Aaron McGruder is a writer on “Red Tails”?Jeez, I remember when everybody thought he was going to be the next Garry Trudeau or Berke Breathed. This is before he moved his focus from “The Boondocks” as a comic-strip to an animated series, and then… just disappeared, I guess. Interesting that he’s working on a Lucas production, too, given his dislike of Lucas’ last few films. At least we know who to blame for the “cheeseball” dialogue, now.

As for the rest. I don’t know whether to be more disgusted by Keira Knightley in a “Romeo and Juliet” spin-off (maybe if it was about her moving to Venice and becoming an ace newspaper editor with a gravelly voice) or the Steven Soderbergh male stripper movie. As for “Woman in Black”– sounds like the BBC equivalent of a Hallmark channel movie. But other than that, Radcliffe’s beginning to look like a young Hugh Jackman, at least when unshaven and without the stupid Harry Potter glasses. I reccomend he be tasked into playing a clone of Wolverine for the rest of his acting career.

Midnight in Paris has legs of steel! That film is still playing at a number of theaters here in Portland and none of them are the bargain screens either. I can’t believe how long it has lasted. Congrats to Allen and everyone involved.

And Channing Tatum was a teen male stripper? WhazzawhozaHUH? That was not news I expected to read this morning.

Bob, I didn’t know about Magruder either. Despite my avowed skepticism, I’m no board Red Tails. As a sucker for the period, the well-rendered CGI combat looks unmissable to me. As for the rest? We’ll see.

I think Rosaline sounds like an interesting idea. I’d like to see them with a little more imaginative casting than Keira, but I say that as someone who likes her.

Joel, this Soderbergh project just kind of popped out of nowhere a few months back amid all the Soderbergh “retirement” rumors. Sounds like it’s going to be a Bubble/GIrlfriend Experience type quickie, though I don’t know that for sure.

Have you heard anything further to the recent murmurings that his “retirement” is actually not really happening? He seems to be going strong and when he announced his “retirement,” he had a set group of final projects lined up. I don’t recall this being among them.

“Rosaline” is just another spin-off, from the sound of it. Nothing more. Actually, it sounds like significantly less, as frankly, it’s not just covering one of the smaller characters from a Shakespeare play– it’s covering one of the NON characters. This isn’t like “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead”, where the players in question have small, bit-roles in the story and can intersect with their own, off-beat misadventures. Rosaline is just some chick Romeo and friends talk about at the beginning of the play– if she were to show up somewhere in the actual story, it’d make sense. As far as Shakespearean prequels go, this sounds like the pits. I’d prefer a flashback to young Capulet and Monteque, or Mercutio’s days before he put a plague on both their houses, an origin story for old King Hamlet’s war with old Fortinbras, or just about anything else.

But at the end of the day, really, it’s just another franchise film remake. Just one that’s a public domain period piece.

As for “Red Tails”– actually, a good deal of the effects in the film are done with models and miniatures courtesy of Kerner Opticals, offshoot of ILM. Actually, all of Lucas’ recent films have had boatloads of traditional physical effects, and technically more than his films int he 70’s and 80’s. Yeah, there’s plenty of CG, too, but oftentimes people mistake shots that are done with models and miniatures simply because they’re so used to how they looked back in the days of optical printers, rather than digital compositing now.

Bob, since neither of us have read the book or seen the movie, we’re both just talking out of our asses. I’m not going to get into an argument with you over a movie that doesn’t exist yet.

Joel, my take on the Soderbergh thing is that he still intends to step away from directing in pursuit of other interests, but I think the whole idea that that’s a “retirement” is overstated. If a movie idea comes along that inspires him down the road, it’s not like he’s going to say “Oh, too bad I retired. I can’t do that now.”